GRAND RAPIDS, Mich. — Claira, the competency analytics engine, today announced it has closed a $3.5M Seed round led by Heartland Ventures, with participation from Trend Forward Capital, Connetic Ventures, Invest Detroit Ventures, and Northern Michigan Angels.
Claira leverages machine learning to create a dynamic digital twin of a company’s human capital. By mapping workforce capabilities with Claira, business leaders are empowered to improve diversity, identify and close resource gaps, provide learning and upskilling opportunities, predict future workforce needs, and hire talent on demand.
More than 10,000 users have added thousands of competencies to their profiles in the first year of activity alone. The company will use the funds to advance machine learning capabilities and accelerate rollout to key customer segments.
As Heartland Ventures’ Partner Conor McGuinness says, “long-term labor challenges are forcing businesses to rethink their workforces. Claira provides a solution by enabling employers to identify and unlock their employees’ hidden talent. Whether it’s the fact that Jane in accounting speaks fluent Spanish or Joe in customer service knows how to weld, Claira shows managers stressed for capacity the internal resources to get the job done today. Our discussions with a variety of mid-market firms made it clear this is a compelling value proposition across all industries.”
After a decade in workforce development, Katie Hall, the company’s founder and CEO, launched the company while earning her MBA at the MIT Sloan School of Management. “The only thing I hate more than inequality is inefficiency,” explained Hall. “Claira attacks both, creating a fair playing field for workers to be judged only on what they can do, while also allowing employers to quantify internal and external talent.”
“The value of competencies in education and work is well established globally but has yet to be packaged in a usable SaaS interface, driven by machine learning and a massive dataset that actually has huge ROI for users.”
A veteran of two prestigious accelerators, Google for Startups and MassChallenge, and a member of the Forbes Next 1000 ranking, Hall assembled a veteran team of business and engineering leaders to help lead Claira. The company has raised $4.4M since launching to the public in November 2020, supported by Varnum LLP in Michigan.
